


Lokum

by Anonymous



Category: Hannibal (TV)
Genre: Ambiguity all around, Cannibalism, F/F, Manipulation, Mentions of past canon relationships, Mutilation, POV Third Person Limited, Serial Killers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-31
Updated: 2015-10-31
Packaged: 2018-04-29 05:28:31
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5117264
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Divergent AU gone very dark. Cannibalism, murder and mutilation practiced by main characters of the story. Alana agree to work for Mason Verger, but wants to get revenge on Hannibal. In process, she finds another preoccupation that leads her down a different path.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lokum

**Author's Note:**

  * For [FreshBrains](https://archiveofourown.org/users/FreshBrains/gifts).



> It's a bit of a slow start with a lot of other characters in the beginning because I wanted to break up with canon plotline properly, but the focus is on the main pair.

Dr. Bloom was waiting for the call. She knew Jack couldn’t resist the hunt. Neither could Will, but she didn’t like thinking about the Will too much these days. Sometimes, even now after his little game was over, it was as if though he became the other; there was the same sense of detachment, same sense of something elusive and fascinating that brought her into _his_ arms that one time - almost brought her into Will’s arms, come to think of it. Perhaps they were same from the start, just that Will used to be more malleable, easier to place under her power than her untouchable mentor. Even when she banished that train of thought and remembered that Will is a victim as well, the temptation to hurt one thing Hannibal cared enough for to ensure its survival reared its ugly head. Sure, he didn’t finish her off either, but he took no pains to ensure she’d survive the fall either, not the way he sliced Will carefully. Nor did he, as far as she knew, promise to kill him. 

She wasn’t fond of Freddie Lounds, but couldn’t help but feel like offering the woman a drink for “Murder Husbands” jib. In hindsight, the macabre courtship was really blatant, even in early stages when it was more like the predator and the prey. She wondered if she was ever in the long-term plans.

The phone rang.

* * *

She's always wanted to visit Italy, but not under these circumstances. Will was there, too, but so was Jack, and he gave her goals; she could focus on the hunt and not think too much about the ironies and imagery they created together.

She’d heard of Dr. Du Maurier before, seen her in the crowd on occasional conferences and events before she retired, but the image of the woman didn't linger in her memory. She remembered feeling perfunctory pity at hearing about her premature retirement the best, pity she was supposed to feel for such an event - the perfect tragedy for a psychiatrist, crystallization of all potential pitfalls of work, a cautionary tale for those that remained. 

Facing the woman now, that pity seemed rude. She didn’t disagree with Will's estimation of her condition, but she wasn’t quite ready to pass judgement either. Bedelia Du Maurier’s dignity didn’t help her case, a fact that the other woman should have known - even though falling apart wouldn’t be helpful before Jack Crawford either. Even if drugs were a lie, Alana knew it wasn’t that clear-cut. He had other ways of making the people do his bidding despite their better judgement. Will and Jack should know that as well - Jack, at least, seemed to take it into account. Will didn’t seem to care - she was nothing more than another thing between him and Hannibal. The one who got what he didn’t take.

She stayed with her while they went on hunting the predator. The captive-slash-victim didn’t thank her, didn’t even speak with her. Alana, on her part, didn’t ask anything. There was nothing she needed explained. She gave a vague estimation of her condition she knew the Italian officers didn’t listen to. She should have been more worried about implications of that, and of Inspector demanding to see Dr. Du Maurier alone. She had been approached by Mason Verger, and she had no doubt he proceeded with his plans. Yet all that occupied her mind at that time was the thought that this must be what deposed queens looked like just before being sent to exile or execution. 

She felt guilty about it afterwards - as she should have, being still the most human of them. But she knew that there was little she could have done, except maybe give Hannibal the opportunity to fulfill his promise.

She turned to what she was able to do - to restoring Bedelia Du Maurier, whom she followed back to US.

For a person in the same field, she was very cooperative. And as dignified as she was when they found her. She didn’t show any distress under repeated questioning, which was much more thorough back home. She called on no connections, no lawyer team to threaten. Alana didn’t feel the need to alter her initial report of basic estimation of drugs in her system at the point she was discovered and their potential effects for her benefit. It would have been an insult.

Still, they never got really close. Du Maurier just said all the right answers. And then she was cleared and went on to give lectures about her capture, still untouchable as ever.

But then Alana decided to focus on being the one keeping Hannibal’s keys. And there she was, on her first campaign party, full of praise for Alana’s treatment. And then she spotted her across the room and smiled for the first time Alana could remember.

From that moment, Bedelia became a fixture in Alana’s life. It wasn’t as sudden as it sounded - first massive gatherings, than predictable call for lunch. Months passed, and acquaintance grew deep enough for a dinner at home as pre-celebration of Alana’s appointment that was to be announced tomorrow. 

It was at that point that Alana asked if this was all about Hannibal’s cage.

Bedelia smiled and said, “I said my goodbyes.”

“Good,” said Alana. And it was. Truth, as she learned when spat out of that whirlwind, was relative.

* * *

Both of them had too much class to make that the first time, but it follows soon after. 

She didn’t bring it up to Hannibal when she saw him over dinner to celebrate his official clinical insanity, but she didn’t shower before seeing him either. He gave no sign of noticing, but she didn't need any to know that he knows.

Bedelia never expressed desire to visit him, and Alana didn’t ask. 

He did ask, however, after a week had passed with no visits but those from other scholars. A simple “How is Bedelia?”, in a neutral tone, which she answered with “great” and nothing else. He asked again on every subsequent meeting, seemingly nothing but polite inquiry for manners’ sake. She returned it in the same way, as if though they were talking about the other’s spouse one isn’t really that acquainted with.

She didn’t mention it to Bedelia. She probably knew, anyway, and she’d bring it up if she thinks it of any consequence. They were all well-versed in psychology here.

* * *

And then they made her co-conspirator in the deal with the devil again. The panic didn't start until she shut the doors of her home.

Bedelia came out of the kitchen and asked “Where are we going?”

* * *

They began to pack after the call, but they have been preparing since she decided to let him out. Bedelia must have been planning for longer than that - must have known the peace was borrowed as long as he lived. She was the one that provided new identities - a temporary measure, she insisted. Alana didn’t inform Jack of the move. She didn’t think about Will.

* * *

The town seemed too small to hide in, but she decided to trust Bedelia’s judgement. She guessed it’s safe - she couldn’t imagine him lingering in a place that didn’t have a proper theater or import goods store in drivable range. 

In the end, the danger came in a rather mundane form; it blindsided her so much, she barely had the time to pull the trigger. But it didn’t leave her with time to think.

The detective didn’t ask too many questions; two women, known offender, textbook case.

Bedelia offered her whiskey and made her sit down.

“How do you feel about it?”

“I…”

“Do you regret it wasn’t… _someone_ else?”

“Yes.”

“How do you feel about the fact you took a life?”

“...Nothing. Nothing yet.”

“It’s all right. You were staring at the wound.”

“Yes. I’ve seen them before. But…”

“Not the ones you caused. Tell me. Could you do it again?”

“...If necessary.”

Bedelia smiled and took Alana’s hand with her own.

“Good.”

She kissed it, back fist, then the palm. then down every finger.

* * *

Next time Alana saw a corpse, it wasn’t of her own making.

“I suppose we look like easy prey,” says Bedelia.

The man was arranged on the kitchen counter. The cuts on him did not look like self-defense.

“Bedelia.”

“Haven’t you ever wondered? It was self-defense, you know. What does it hurt to do a little bit more? He doesn’t need it anymore.”

Alana bit her lip.

“Don’t you wish to be able to finally understand?”

She took the offered knife.

They left a week later, as silently as they arrived.

* * *

“You do realize he already fed you it as he pleased? We need to overcome him to be free of him. We must partake in it of our own volition. We don’t have to do it anymore."

The table was set. The appearance of the dish was far from a giveaway, not that she’d be able to tell the difference, even now.

She figured she might as well. It was already slain and prepared. And she had nowhere else to go.

Her partner is not that good at robbing the meat of the peculiarities, but she doesn’t mention it. Bedelia had to know it herself, now that she tried it, and probably knows how to improve it as well.

* * *

They explore. 

It’s okay because they only prey upon those who should be put down already. It’s easy to lure them. Rapists, robbers, self-righteous homophobes whose zealotry went too far. All they have to do is be seen.

They explore the basic anatomy first, reviewing the old lessons. They try for extraction of parts in edible state, next. Beyond the liver, spleen and kidneys, it seems harder than average surgery. Alana wishes she listened to Abigail’s explanations more carefully. She wishes she managed to unfreeze and talk to the girl. Maybe it would have been three of them, then. Three of them on their own, free of false benefactors.

But to Alana, it’s just a phase. Bedelia seems more interested - she acquired a taste while behind the veil, Alana imagines - so she lets her experiment with preparation. She partakes sometimes, when she feels like it.

She almost replicates The Shrike’s form before the reason stops her. Too soon. Too close.

She goes for patchwork instead. Not a pole, a flat picture. That should be distant enough. One person, then two. She ends up going for color variant; no one seems to connect it to the picture of the eye, at least not in press, not even Freddie.

Bedelia still seems to delight in innards, even those she’s discarding. Alana is not fond of the smell, but she doesn’t object. Not until the sausages and stench that refused to go away for days, that is.

Once she’s done with limbs and bones and organs apiece, she tries for separating layers of tissue. That took a lot of experimenting; simple cut was not enough. And, unfortunately, the scale wouldn’t let her work under a microscope; she fashions a headgear with magnifying glass, but it can help only so far and working conditions aren’t always optimal; not all materials can be taken home. And then, she weaves: simple cross pattern at first, then more complex.

She takes particular time with the brain, and keeps revisiting it; as the psychiatrist, she could only poke at it through the fog. She only had access to the interface; the inside was a mystery. She persuades with Bedelia and, in exchange for being a taste tester for her cooking experiments for the duration, gets to take a risk and make an entire opus dedicated to the brain, based on what little the anatomy she remembers, cutting up the mass and marking the points of interest with needles, sometimes within the body, sometimes outside. They lay low after that for several months on a different continent, and she is not sure if she will ever dare to touch it again.

She goes back to weaving, now adding more chemical preparation to threads, trying to defy the rot. No guts and hair - too easy, too common. Unless she comes to the point she’s able to unravel and then reweave the entire body at her will. Her ultimate goal - for now -is to be able to put her work in her living room with none the wiser. 

She still doesn’t feel comfortable in adopting _his_ modus operandi. She doesn’t have the confidence to get close to target and feed them until their taste is improved. Bedelia is not pleased, but bows down when reminded of the fact it might attract undesired attention. 

Undesired by Alana, at least. She can’t help but question Bedelia occasionally.

* * *

And no one ever suspects. It doesn’t surprise Alana. Criminal psychology, in general, recognises three kinds of female serial killers: black widows, angels of mercy and assistant to the male killer. Discussion of high-functioning sociopathy is reserved for men. Same for thrills.

“Countess Bathory would disagree,” says Bedelia when she shares this observation.

It's another layer of security, at least. She's still torn between desire to be daring and urge to be careful. She doesn't have much to fall on if they're caught. She isn't sure if she could go on without Bedelia. She doesn't want to, either, but specks of old reason that remained warn her of her partner's experience, of her own tendency to attach herself to the wrong person. The doctor wants to believe she learned better; the scholar is ever skeptical.

**Author's Note:**

> Lokum because I when I wrote the story I thought of something sweet, but the regular confectionery wouldn't do. Simple appearance yet complex taste, honey base and rosewater, and not for untrained palate seemed just right.


End file.
